The Mighty Hand Of God

Just lift our Bibles and wave them around, make Jesus glad, the devil mad.

That's our custom around here, and all of us say it together.

I can't hear you say it, but I believe, by faith, you are saying it, and let's make this confession, say Heavenly Father, I've tuned in to live stream tonight because I'm hungry and thirsty for more, more of you, more of your spirit, more of your presence, more of your word.

I'm being taught the Word of God.

The Word of God is not returning to your void, but it's prospering in me, it's making a difference in my life.

I'm maturing in the things of God and I have the victory in Jesus' name, amen.

Let's turn in our Bibles tonight to 1 Peter, chapter five, and we'll start reading with verse five.

And Peter's talking to the church.

He said likewise you younger, younger Christians, younger people, submit yourselves under the elder.

Yay, all of you.

Be subject one to another and be clothed with humility, don't you like that?

The King James says be clothed with humility, for God resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble.

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God.

Let's all say that together, mighty hand of God, and that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for he careth for you.

Amen.

And so, oh, let's keep reading verse eight.

Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil as a roaring lion, doesn't call him a lion, it just says he's as a roaring lion.

Walketh about seeking whom he may devour, whom resists, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

So tonight I wanted to share a message entitled a mighty hand of God.

You know God's hand is a mighty hand.

You know you've got God's hand and you've got man's hand.

Which one are you gonna choose?

I think I'm gonna choose God's hand.

And it says here in Zechariah, four or six not by might nor by power, not by man's hand, but by my spirit, sayeth the Lord.

And so here in the New Testament, ever since the Holy Ghost was poured out, the hand of the Lord, the mighty hand of God, is the Holy Spirit.

He is the enforcement arm of the Godhead.

You know, the Father's in heaven, on the throne, jesus, is at his right hand, but the Holy Spirit is in the church.

The Holy Spirit is everywhere here present, and he is the manifestation of God's mighty hand.

So the Bible.

When you read it, it's a record of ordinary people accomplishing extraordinary I should say supernatural things, and especially when the mighty hand of God came upon them.

And I have a few examples here.

In First Kings 1846.

You might know I'm not gonna have you turn there, but you can later.

First Kings 1846.

Ahab the king is down the mountain there and Elijah the prophet is up on the mountain side with his head between his legs, with his knees, praying, and he's asking his servant go check and see if you see a cloud.

No, I don't see a cloud.

Go see a cloud.

Why?

Because he has prayed that it rain.

You know he prayed three, you know, three and a half years before, and it didn't rain.

Now he's praying for it to rain because there's been some cleansing in the land.

He got rid of the 400 prophets of Baal, so he's prayed for it to rain.

So, mighty power, god's, james, chapter five, when we pray, mighty power, god's mighty powers released tremendous powers made available.

And so finally he said well, I don't see a cloud.

No, I see one.

It's like the size of a man's hand.

He said get thee down, let the rain catch thee not and I've been at that place, it's desert, but there are hills and mountains off in the distance that collect rainwater.

Every now and then it'll rain in that land and when it does it sends flash floods right in that area.

And of course the prophet knew that he didn't want to be caught in a flash flood.

So he said, look, we better not wait till it rains, we better get out of here now.

And the Bible says the hand of the Lord came upon the prophet Elijah and he outran Ahab's chariot all the way to Jezreel Well, that's 20 miles.

The hand of God came upon him, the mighty hand of God.

It's amazing, isn't it?

And then in second Kings 315, elisha is in the presence of Jehoshaphat, the king of the southern kingdom, benjamin and Judah.

And then there was the northern kingdom, that, that king who was wicked.

And the wicked king asked Elijah, have you got a word?

He said, look, if it wasn't for Jehoshaphat here, I wouldn't even look at you, much less listen to you.

But because he's here, I'm going to bring me a minstrel.

And the minstrel played.

And when he did, the Bible says the hand of the Lord came upon the prophet Elisha and he prophesied the answer.

He prophesied this valley full of ditches.

And it will be that tomorrow God will fill the ditches with water.

Well, this is again.

It's a dry place.

But that's exactly what happened the next morning.

All those ditches that they dug in that valley filled with water and they were up against the Moabites.

It was a superior force.

When they looked at the water, they saw the sun reflecting off of the top surface early in the morning, off the top surface of the water, and they thought it was blood.

They thought somehow Israel had suffered some kind of military loss and that was the blood of soldiers.

So they went rushing down in there to fight them, try to clean up, and Israel rose up and smoked the Moabites and spoiled them and chased them out of the territory and there became a big victory.

Well, what all began?

With the hand of the Lord, the mighty hand of God, coming upon the prophet In Ezekiel 37.1,.

Ezekiel, the hand of the Lord came upon him after certain days and took him off into the valley of dry bones and he said can these bones live?

Oh Lord, thou knowest, he prophesied over the dry bones.

And the dry bones lived because the mighty hand of God came upon the prophet.

So we see in the Old Testament that the mighty hand of God could come upon the priest, the prophet and the king.

Another thing that we see in the Bible is the mighty hand of God that comes against certain people, and I think that's really relevant right now, especially, I think, when we pray according to the Word of God.

God can bring His mighty hand and line it up against those that wanna do harm to the church, those that wanna do harm to this nation.

In Exodus 9.3,.

I think we ought to turn back there and look at this Exodus.

This is when Moses is bringing a demonstration of judgment against Egypt because they wouldn't let my people go.

Exodus 9, it says here in verse 3.

Verse 2, if you refuse to let them go and will hold them still, behold a hand of the Lord.

This is Moses speaking to Pharaoh.

Behold, a hand of the Lord is upon your cattle, which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the donkeys, upon the camels, upon the oxen and upon the sheep, and there shall be a very grievous moraine.

Well, what does that all represent?

Are we focusing on their animals?

They are valuable agricultural commodities.

I mean without these, these are all farm animals, and this impacts their finances.

And so the hand of the Lord came upon their livestock and their animals, their working animals, their donkeys and their camels and all of that.

And isn't that amazing?

I mean, god came against their finances by coming against their animals and they had diseases and a lot of the animals died.

Why the hand of the Lord came against them?

Because of the resistance that Pharaoh gave to God.

Amen.

In Deuteronomy 2.15, you find that many of the children of Israel, the men of war, doubted the power of God and doubted about going into the Promised Land.

They didn't think they were able.

The Bible says the hand of the Lord came against the men of war who doubted and they began to be cut short.

They began to die in the wilderness.

So it's kind of serious when the hand of the Lord comes against someone and Judges 2.15, the Bible says the hand of the Lord came against Israel because of their idolatry.

I think there's been a certain amount of the hand of the Lord come against the nation of America, not the church.

You know God's not working against the church.

We're.

His only instrument for good in this whole world is the church.

So he doesn't come against the church, that would be counterproductive.

But he can come against America.

Why?

Because America has a covenant and they're violating it.

They said that they were establishing.

You know, through the Mayflower Compact, they obligated this nation, and then that was doubled down at the time of the Constitution.

When we had the Declaration of Independence, we declared that this country is a Christian nation founded upon Judeo-Christian principles.

That's why they had the 10 commandments at the Supreme Court.

This is a Christian nation, don't let anybody tell you different.

But the nation, the hand of the Lord, has come against him somewhat at times.

And so you know, we need to pray that people wake up and repent.

And so well, pastor, all of that is fine and good, but you're just giving us Old Testament scriptures.

Well, let me give you a couple more examples.

In book of Acts, chapter 12, the Bible says Herod killed Philip or James, the brother of John.

Acts 12 · chapter mention

Excuse me, he killed James, the brother of John, and he intended to kill Peter after Easter.

And it says instant and earnest prayer.

See, that's that subject again, prayer was made by the church under God for Peter, and I mean, they prayed, and God sent angels to break him out of jail.

And then, a few weeks later, herod appears in a place called Caesarea Philippi and he's giving an oration and the people.

He was so powerful in his oratory that the people shouted and said this is the voice of God and not man.

And he gave not God the glory and an angel standing by smote him and, you know, hitting, physically hitting, and he was eating with worms and died.

So you could say the hand of the Lord came against Herod because of prayer.

They didn't pray specifically that he would die, but they did pray and God acted against a ruler.

In Acts 1311, it talks about an Elimist the sorcerer, who had done great.

He was trying to keep the deputy from the faith and I think it's worth looking at this one.

This is New Testament, folks, and you know I got ahold of these scriptures a long time ago.

It helped me learn how to pray for our government, learn how to pray against some of the things that we're seeing.

And so, dopo, verse nine, then Saul, who is also called Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on this man, elimus the sorcerer, and said oh, full of all subtlety and mischief, thou child of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, kneel down and pray the sinner's prayer, and God will save you and I'll get you baptized in water.

No, he didn't try to get him saved.

Yeah, you know, there's a time.

There's a time to approach people and then there's a time to do what Paul did.

He called it like he was you're an enemy of righteousness, will you not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?

And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee and you shall be blind, not seeing the sun for a season.

And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand.

And so you know, paul knew something about that right there, because the hand of the Lord came against Paul.

When he was saved, when he saw Jesus on the road to Damascus, what happened?

He saw the glory, but he wasn't saved yet.

He hadn't given his heart to Jesus.

Yet when he saw Jesus and saw in his glory, jesus said saw, saw.

Why persecute us, thou and me?

It's hard for thee to kick against the Prince.

And he said who art thou, lord?

He said I am Jesus, whom you persecute us.

So he was persecuting the church.

When he was hailing people off to jail, he was persecuting Jesus.

So that's how one the church and Jesus are.

So no one ever think that the hand of the Lord comes against the church, because the hand of the Lord can't come against Jesus.

We're the body of Christ.

Now.

He can correct us, he can give us instructions, but the hand of the Lord comes against those that are in the world, came against Elimus the sorcerer, and he just repeated the judgment he went through because exactly what happened to Elimus the sorcerer a few years before that happened to Paul.

He was blinded by that light and he had to have somebody lead him by the hand, but the difference was that it didn't last the three days because Ananias the disciple went and laid hands on him and he got healed.

So we see, then, that the mighty hand of God can come upon people for good and it can come against people, and that's not just Old Testament, it's Bible, and we see here that there's a hint that we find in James, chapter five, verse 16,.

It says the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous person avails much.

The amplified says it brings much power to bear dynamic, and it's working, and I believe that the church will learn how to pray correctly, for the government to pray correctly and quit being religious.

These people have grown up in America.

They have rejected Christ and we have no business praying for them.

We need to pray against them.

We need to cry against the president Biden.

We need to cry against these non-elected bureaucrats that are issuing edicts that are not science.

They're all about politics.

They're all about power.

They're all about getting a population condition to become compliant and to do what it's told.

Yeah, fauci said the other day don't worry about your freedoms, just do what you're told, we'll know.

Thank you, mr Arrogance.

I say the hand of the Lord comes against you, fauci, in Jesus' name, you're gonna be looking for somebody to take you by the hand.

I said that under the anointing and I tell you what it went out and I meant it.

I meant it from my heart.

I never even thought about it before.

Praise God, all right.

So I mean when the church starts learning how to make declarations and learns how to use God's mighty power, his tremendous power, the mighty hand of God is the Holy Ghost.

And where is the Holy Ghost?

It's in the church.

He's in the church.

So the key to the mighty hand of God coming upon you for good is humility and faith.

You know, the Bible says be clothed with humility.

First Peter.

Going back to first Peter, chapter five.

It says be clothed.

You know, put your humble clothes on, don't get your arrogant clothes on.

Don't get your mad clothes on.

You can get glad the same britches that you got mad in.

That's what my mother used to tell me, and so it's the same way.

We ought to clothe ourselves.

We ought to put on, we ought to clothe ourselves, we ought to put on humility.

And so the Bible says humble yourself.

See, god's not going to do the humbling, you have to do it yourself.

Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God.

See, you realize that you're not everything.

He's everything, and he likes to use disciples.

So humble yourself, see.

Humbling yourself doesn't mean thinking less of yourself.

I read a post on Facebook where somebody was quoting some old hymn that I'm not familiar with, and it was one of these weak worms, that's all I'm just.

You know, like that old country song I'm just an old lump of coal, but I'm gonna be a diamond someday.

Well, you're already a diamond.

Jesus made you a diamond.

You're not going to be, you're not a lump of coal.

If you're, if you're saved.

And so somebody I remember, brother Osteen, told the story.

He was about to speak at a gathering.

It was a secular gathering, but there was a Baptist deacon there that that said brother, I just feel like we ought to go back here and pray.

Let me pray for you, get out there and get get the microphone.

And so this, this brother got up there and he was praying this prayer like he had always heard everybody else pray.

Oh Lord, I'm just a wicked sinner.

I'm not even worthy to be in your presence.

I don't even know why you would even look at me, much less listen to me.

But I'm begging you, oh anoint this man, give him the words to speak.

And and Brother Osteen stopped him.

He said really, are you in that condition?

Are you a backslidden sinner?

He said, well, no, I'm just, you know, figure of speech.

He said, well, no, I thought a figure of speech, that's this.

You're not even, you're not scriptural in what you said.

And the guy just kind of thought, what in the world?

And?

And he just didn't think of it correctly.

And so he corrected himself and prayed a good, strong prayer after that.

So that's not humility, that's false humility.

So humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less, in other words, when you're a servant of all, when you give your life for others, you're invested in other people and you, you, you're going about constantly looking to be a blessing to someone else.

See, that's true humility.

And in verse five it said God resists, he resists the proud, but he lifts up and gives ability to the humble.

He gives.

He lifts up and gives ability, he promotes.

See, god's not against you being promoted, he's against you promoting yourself.

See, there again, promoting yourself is part of pride.

What does God do to that?

His hand comes against you.

The hand of the Lord will literally come against you and stop you and make things hard.

You know another example that I got a few months ago.

We were praying about our nation and I got that at the Red Sea, where the people passed over on dry ground.

Pharaoh and his army came down to where the Red Sea had parted and they, they were about to try to use the same pathway.

That was an escape route that God provided for Israel to escape and he did not build that escape route and turn it into a way for Pharaoh to go and kill his people.

It wasn't available to Pharaoh, pharaoh didn't know it.

But the Bible says there in Exodus that God looked out from the cloud, the pillar of cloud, the pillar of fire.

By night, cloud by day.

When he looked out of the cloud, he saw Pharaoh and his army and he despised them and he began to send angels to knock off his chariot wheels and they began to not be able to make progress and then, by and by, the waters covered them and they all drowned in the Red Sea, trying to pursue Israel.

So there again another example of God resisting and God working against his mighty hand.

But God's hand can come upon you to give you ability, he can promote you.

I just think about the hand of the Lord coming upon this church the last two years.

You know, next month it'll be two years ago when God, on a Sunday night, gave me this, or was it Wednesday night?

I forgot now, and but the hand of the Lord came upon me.

As a good description.

Who is the hand of the Lord.

The Holy Ghost came upon me and I prophesied like I was in a zone.

I was in a place with God where I spoke and prophesied for 20 plus minutes and out of that came the greatest year yet.

That's what God began to say, greatest year yet.

And then God began to add to that, and one of the things God said is hey, let's, god's going to increase our footprint.

And three words came out of that word that night I think it came the next Sunday but that we would have God's perspective, god's power and then prominence.

Well, this church has never sought to have prominence, but God has given us prominence.

I mean, we were all over the news media when we took a stand against this robbing of our rights to gather and peacefully assemble and have church.

We resisted that and it struck a nerve across the country.

And so God's not against you being promoted, he's against you promoting yourself.

But God's mighty hand can promote you.

I believe his hand is still on our church.

He's still on you when we take up the cause of Jesus.

And so, and then it says in verse seven cast a whole of your care on him, for he careth for you.

So what is pride?

Pride is worry.

Pride is forgetting God's care over you, as if you could do anything about anything yourself.

I mean, listen, you've got to get settled on.

Worrying is a fear is a sin.

Worry is a sin.

Worry is taking your eyes off of God's care.

You can go to sleep every night and sleep soundly, no matter what's going on, because God's got your back.

He's saying to you I've got this.

Do we know how to turn things over to him?

And see, it's not something we do every day, we do it once.

God, from now on I'll never worry again.

I cast a whole of my care once and for all upon you, because I know you care for me, and when we're tempted to worry, brother Hagin was a chronic worrier because he was paralyzed in bed of sickness and expected to die.

All the doctors said he had to die.

So he was afraid of death.

He wasn't saved yet and he worried about everything.

He worried about the weather, he worried about tornadoes killing him where he couldn't run.

He worried about this, he worried about that.

And so when he came across these verses oh Lord, I can't be a Christian, I don't know how I can not worry.

Well, you just cast a whole of your care on him.

He's the one that cares for you, he's the one that's watching over you.

Amen.

So, really, worry is a form.

It's a form of pride, because you think, by your thinking about something and stewing over it, that somehow it's gonna change things.

No, it's gonna make it worse.

Ha, ha, ha, oh, let's all say the mighty hand of God is coming upon me, amen.

So it's just an encouragement.

You know, I know, we know these things, but sometimes it's good to hear about it.

So let's do two columns.

You know, I used to, I liked it, I liked it separated, and I've got the mighty hand of God at the top of the page and I put upon.

And then I put against, the mighty hand of God upon in one column, against in another column, down the.

Upon column Number one.

The mighty hand of God is upon humility, so that's why we put it on.

And the mighty hand of God is against pride.

We resist that every chance we get, when we know that pride is rising up, when we want to brag, when we want to take credit.

You know, let's just start developing that in our life that we're not going to be guilty of pride.

Bragg on Jesus, brag on God.

Give God all the praise and all the credit for all the good things that he's done.

That's the way to stay under the hand of God, the mighty hand of God.

So, upon humility, against pride.

Upon number two faith in patience and against worry and impatience.

Faith in patience inherits the promises.

Faith calls a thing, that be not as though it were.

And patience means that you just praise God until it manifests.

That's patience.

Oh, I'm so impatient.

No, quit saying that, and start praising God for the answer it's.

You've already prayed, you've already believed, you've received it's as good as done.

So just praising that's patience.

But the hand of the Lord is against worry and he's against impatience.

When we're impatient, when we want to jump ahead, when we feel like God is late, god is never late.

God is always on time, and so it's us.

Many times we're impatient, we want to take shortcuts.

We want to.

There are no, there are no shortcuts.

There are no shortcuts.

I mean God.

You know we're in for the count.

So the hand of the Lord will come against you if you let yourself worry and become impatient for the answer to show up.

And finally, the last one the mighty hand of God is upon praise and it's against complaining and murmuring when you allow yourself to complain.

There's a lot of complaining right now.

There's a lot of complaining about our nation, a lot of complaining about our government.

We've got to guard against joining the spirit that's coming against us.

You know, the spirit that's coming against us is one of exaggeration, they're changing the meaning of words, they're lying about our history, they're lying about this or lying about that.

I mean Biden actually stood up and said that he couldn't have done a better job of evacuating Afghanistan.

I mean he said that today.

I mean a lion, I mean he's got a lion devil on the inside of him.

I mean you can't depend on anything he said.

And I mean, just, this was a catastrophic failure and people are dying because of it.

We're going to pray a little while, but let's call it what it is.

I'm not.

I'm not murmuring about it, I'm speaking truth to answer all of this stuff that they put out there.

And but God, the mighty hand of God, is on praise.

You know, the Bible says God inhabits the praises of his people.

So the more we praise God right in the midst of trouble, the more the hand of the Lord is upon us.

And so let's balance.

You know I just had to wear.

I don't watch the news, even the, even the news that I agree with.

I've got some news channels by the Copeland's, got a good one.

I never watch it.

They're preaching to the choir and I don't want to hear all the bad news.

I don't want to hear all that.

I read headlines only.

I got headlines.

I'll give that a few minutes every day.

I pretty well I knew what was going on today.

I know what's going on in Afghanistan.

I know what's going on in Haiti.

We're going to pray over Haiti.

But I'm not going to immerse myself in those stories.

I'm not going to baptize myself in all the bad news and then start talking to everybody about it, complaining and murmuring.

Why?

Because the hand of the Lord is going to eventually come against me.

I'm fighting against his plan.

He's got a plan for his hand to come in yet again on this nation.

He's not through with America, let's not forget.

I think about Miriam.

You know Moses' sister.

She got to murmuring, complaining, her, and Aaron and well, I'm a prophet, just as he is, I can hear from God and besides that, he married this woman.

You know she's a dark woman and she shouldn't be his wife.

Blah, blah, blah.

And they were out there talking bad about God's man.

And while she was yet talking, you know, leprosy broke in on her.

You could say the hand of the Lord doesn't say that, but the hand of the Lord came against her.

And then Aaron got all excited.

He went and confessed to Moses what they had done.

We've sinned, we've said things we shouldn't say.

Oh, pray for your sister, oh, it's terrible, he's got, oh, she's got.

And so did he did.

Moses was the most humble man, the most meek man on all the earth, and he fell to his face and cried out to God for his sister.

Oh God, don't let this thing happen to her.

And he said if she spit in her father's face, she'd be unclean a week.

I'm not going to heal her instantly.

She's going to be outside the camp for a week.

What happened?

The hand of the Lord came against her, humiliated her, and the entire nation of Israel came to a grinding halt until she got her healing a week later.

And then he did heal her and he wanted to use her as an example, a negative example, that murmuring and complaining and gossiping is about the worst thing you can do.

If you want the hand of the Lord to start working against you, start doing that.

Amen.

Now I believe that there's forgiveness.

I believe the blood of Jesus can cleanse us, but until we confess it, we're at risk for having God himself working against us.

I don't want God working against me, amen.

So let the mighty hand of God be upon you to do great things.

Amen.

Great things for who?

For him, great things for him.

The mighty hand of God, and who is that?

That's the Holy Ghost.

The Holy Ghost, don't forget.

The Holy Ghost is the mighty hand of God.

Come on, lift your hands and receive this encouragement tonight.

Praise God.